1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to control systems and more particularly to a system and method for providing an optical remote control interface.
2. Description of Art Related to the Invention
With increasing use of electronic equipment such as audio and video devices, there is also a corresponding increase in the use of remote control units for accessing the electronic equipment. However, when the equipment is not within the range of the remote control, it is difficult to provide control signals to the equipment. The user is thus unable to access equipment that is outside the operational range of a corresponding remote control device.
One solution to this problem is to configure electronic equipment is to support communications via a common communication interface. One such interface is the IEEE 1394-1995 serial digital bus, which is a low cost, high performance peripheral bus. To provide communications via the IEEE bus, a common communications protocol is implemented. Currently, one such communications protocol is the Home Audio video Interoperability (HAVi) software protocol. However, not all electronic devices are currently configured to support the IEEE 1394 serial bus, nor are they all configured to support the HAVi protocol.
Accordingly, there is a need in the technology for a system and method for providing an interface between an optical remote control device and the targeted device, so that access to remotely located devices, or devices that are outside the operational range of the remote control may be facilitated.